AI Factory Chess Difficulty Level 7 to 8

Hi guys, I'm now semi retirement and have tried a few hobbies to keep me occupied, recently got back into Chess after 50 years. I guess I was an Intermediate player back then, not sure what level I am now. However considering I haven't played a chess game against an actual person since 1971 I doubt I would be much competition for Intermediate players here.

Anyway, I downloaded the AI Factory Free Chess Ap a few months back and have progressed up the levels at a measured pace to ensure I don't out of my depth to soon. Three days ago I accepted progression to Level 8 and was surprised at how much more difficult it is compared to Level 7.

I found I could hold my own at Level 7 until mid game when the AI seemed to take pity on me and leave it's Queen exposed, or do something equally stupid. From then it was relatively easy. Not so at Level 8, it goes in Hard and I haven't looked like beating it over the last few days. 

I have no idea what Level 8 on this game compares to other AI games or the National Chess rating or whatever it's called.

Can some members here please provide more info about this game/level and suggest any ways to beat it. 

I have managed to win by playing a more aggressive game. 

Hi,

Interesting that your should mention AI Factory's Chess Free app because that's what I've been mostly playing an occasional game against over the years until I decided to come back to chess 100% in July of this year.  Honestly, this is the first time I'm seriously studying chess again since my teens (I am in my late 40's now but also had some brief spurts of chess activity in my early 20's, mid 20's, late 20's and early 30's)

It's also my feeling that level 8 is where this program gets significantly better. I feel that level 7 is a good practice level for me when I want to try out different lines and "warm up", but if I were actually getting ready for some tournament play, I'd probably crank it up to level 8

I got really curious how this AI Factory Chess compares to Stockfish, and I set Stockfish to level 4 and AI Factory Chess to level 7 with no time controls. This is the game, and AI Factory Chess beat level 4 Stockfish handsomely. I am going to keep increasing Stockfish level until it can beat the AI Factory Chess Free, and will post the games here

[Event "Casual Correspondence game"] [Site "https://lichess.org/hPV8UkdD"] [Date "2021.12.04"] [White "AI Factory Chess Free at level 7"] [Black "lichess AI level 4"] [Result "1-0"] [UTCDate "2021.12.04"] [UTCTime "19:33:05"] [WhiteElo "?"] [BlackElo "?"] [Variant "Standard"] [TimeControl "-"] [ECO "B02"] [Opening "Alekhine Defense: Scandinavian Variation"] [Termination "Normal"] [Annotator "lichess.org"] 1. e4 d5 2. Nc3 Nf6 { B02 Alekhine Defense: Scandinavian Variation } 3. exd5 Nxd5 4. g3 e5 5. Bg2 Nf6 6. Nge2 Nc6 7. Bxc6+ bxc6 8. d4 Qd6 9. dxe5 Qxd1+ 10. Nxd1 Nd5 11. O-O Ba6 12. Re1 O-O-O 13. Nf4 Nb4 14. Ne3 Bc5 15. e6 g5 16. a3 Na2 17. e7 Bxe7 18. Nf5 Bf8 19. Rxa2 c5 20. Nh5 Be2 21. Nhg7 Bc4 22. b3 Be6 23. Bxg5 Bxf5 24. Nxf5 Rd5 25. g4 Bd6 26. h4 Rf8 27. Bf6 Rxf5 28. gxf5 Kb7 29. Kg2 Rc8 30. Kf3 a6 31. c4 a5 32. Ree2 Rg8 33. Re3 h5 34. Bg5 Rh8 35. a4 Rc8 36. Bf4 Kb6 37. Rd2 Rg8 38. Bxd6 Rd8 39. Bxc5+ Kc6 40. Rxd8 Kxc5 41. Rb8 Kd6 42. b4 Kd7 43. bxa5 c5 44. a6 Kc6 45. Rb7 f6 46. Re6# { White wins by checkmate. } 1-0

I've increased Stockfish level from 4 to 5 and kept the Chess Free at level 7.

After some absolutely cringe-worthy and dreadful opening moves on both sides, Chess Free ends up developing a nice position and wins comfortably.  Stockfish @ level 5 is completely lost in this game, and it is being an utter positional dunce, playing completely planless chess throughout the whole game.

[Event "Casual Correspondence game"] [Site "https://lichess.org/IXTFUZKk"] [Date "2021.12.04"] [White "lichess AI level 5"] [Black "AI Factory Chess Free AI level 7"] [Result "0-1"] [UTCDate "2021.12.04"] [UTCTime "20:11:58"] [WhiteElo "?"] [BlackElo "?"] [Variant "Standard"] [TimeControl "-"] [ECO "A00"] [Opening "Van't Kruijs Opening"] [Termination "Normal"] [Annotator "lichess.org"] 1. e3 { A00 Van't Kruijs Opening } g6 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nc3 d5 4. h4 Bf5 5. Nd4 Bd7 6. Nb3 Be6 7. Nc5 Bc8 8. Qe2 b6 9. Nb3 Bb7 10. h5 e5 11. Qd1 Nxh5 12. d4 Nd7 13. dxe5 Nxe5 14. Qd4 f6 15. Be2 c5 16. Qh4 Ng7 17. f3 Nf5 18. Qa4+ Bc6 19. Bb5 Qd6 20. Bxc6+ Nxc6 21. f4 d4 22. Nb5 Qd7 23. O-O Nb4 24. Nc7+ Kd8 25. Qxd7+ Kxd7 26. Nxa8 Nxc2 27. e4 Nxa1 28. exf5 Nxb3 29. Nxb6+ axb6 30. axb3 gxf5 31. Rf3 Ke6 32. Kf1 b5 33. Rd3 b4 34. g3 h5 35. Rd1 h4 36. gxh4 Rxh4 37. Ke2 Bd6 38. Kd3 Kd5 39. Bd2 Bxf4 40. Rf1 Bxd2 41. Rxf5+ Ke6 42. Rxc5 Be3 43. Rc6+ Ke5 44. Rc4 Rh2 45. Rc5+ Kf4 46. Rc2 Rxc2 47. Kxc2 Ke4 48. Kd1 Kd3 49. Ke1 Kc2 50. Kf1 d3 51. Ke1 d2+ 52. Ke2 Bg5 53. Kf3 d1=Q+ 54. Kg2 f5 55. Kg3 Qf1 56. Kh2 Bf4# { Black wins by checkmate. } 0-1

I increased Stockfish level from 5 to 6 while keeping Chess Free at level 7, and boy, the tables have turned big time! This time, it was Chess Free that played an abysmally horrible opening as White and was completely lost and planless throughout the game. Stockfish @ level 6 made mistakes, but it generally had a much better idea what to do throughout the game.

[Event "Casual Correspondence game"] [Site "https://lichess.org/4TehGXZY"] [Date "2021.12.04"] [White "AI Factory Chess Free AI level 7"] [Black "lichess AI level 6"] [Result "0-1"] [UTCDate "2021.12.04"] [UTCTime "20:44:03"] [WhiteElo "?"] [BlackElo "?"] [Variant "Standard"] [TimeControl "-"] [ECO "B20"] [Opening "Sicilian Defense: Snyder Variation"] [Termination "Normal"] [Annotator "lichess.org"] 1. e4 c5 2. b3 { B20 Sicilian Defense: Snyder Variation } e6 3. Qe2 Nc6 4. Bb2 Nge7 5. Nf3 a6 6. a4 d5 7. Qe3 h5 8. Qf4 f6 9. exd5 exd5 10. d4 Nb4 11. Na3 Nec6 12. Rc1 Bd6 13. Qe3+ Kf7 14. dxc5 Bc7 15. c4 Re8 16. Ne5+ Nxe5 17. Be2 Ned3+ 18. Kd2 Nxb2 19. Bxh5+ g6 20. Qh6 dxc4+ 21. Kc3 Be5+ 22. Kxb4 Nd3+ 23. Kxc4 b5+ 24. Nxb5 axb5+ 25. Kxb5 Rb8+ 26. Kc4 Rb4# { Black wins by checkmate. } 0-1

As far as advice about playing against AI Chess Free, apparently, it's just horrible at playing against Sicilian with White pieces. Apparently, the developers might not have included sufficient book moves for it, so it improvises quite badly. Another weakness I've noticed with Chess Free is that it can be extremely slow to castle and tuck its king to safety. Generally, playing lines against it where you develop all your pieces and castles as quickly as possible puts you at a great advantage against this AI.

Raised Chess Free level to 8 and kept Stockfish at 6. This is some of the most hideous chess I've seen in the longest time, so much so, that it made me burst into laughter. It is especially funny how Stockfish at level 6 cannot even find the simplest checkmate at the very end.

More games are of course needed to evaluate the Chess Free's true strength, but it's starting to look like that training with Stockfish at level 6 will probably give one a tougher game than playing against AI Chess Free at levels 7 or 8:

[Event "Casual Correspondence game"] [Site "https://lichess.org/W2qKY3Fd"] [Date "2021.12.04"] [White "lichess AI level 6"] [Black "AI Factory Chess Free AI level 8"] [Result "1-0"] [UTCDate "2021.12.04"] [UTCTime "21:04:50"] [WhiteElo "?"] [BlackElo "?"] [Variant "Standard"] [TimeControl "-"] [ECO "D05"] [Opening "Queen's Pawn Game: Colle System"] [Termination "Normal"] [Annotator "lichess.org"] 1. d4 d5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. e3 e6 { D05 Queen's Pawn Game: Colle System } 4. Be2 c5 5. O-O Nc6 6. Nc3 Bd7 7. Ne5 h5 8. a3 Rc8 9. Nxd7 Qxd7 10. h4 Rd8 11. g3 Qc7 12. dxc5 Bxc5 13. Bd2 Qd7 14. Bf3 a6 15. Bg2 Ba7 16. Qe2 b5 17. Na2 Qc8 18. a4 bxa4 19. Nb4 Nxb4 20. Bxb4 Qc6 21. Bc3 Rc8 22. Rfe1 O-O 23. Bxf6 gxf6 24. Qxh5 Qxc2 25. Red1 f5 26. g4 fxg4 27. Qxg4+ Kh7 28. Rxa4 Bb8 29. Qh5+ Kg7 30. Rg4+ Qg6 31. Bf1 Rc6 32. Bd3 Qxg4+ 33. Qxg4+ Kh8 34. Qh5+ Kg7 35. Qg4+ Kh8 36. Qh5+ Kg7 37. Qg5+ Kh8 38. Qh6+ Kg8 39. Qg5+ Kh8 40. Qh6+ Kg8 41. Bh7+ { Black resigns. } 1-0

Thank you for your detailed response, It's still 'begin again' for me, some time before chess notation etc becomes 'familiar.' At this stage I'm only using the Chess Free ap for practice play and doing Chess puzzles to increase my knowledge and experience. As I intimated earlier, when I got caught up in defensive play the AI was a challenge. However, when I switched to offensive play with some strategies the AI does find it hard to keep up. I guess most of the chess robots have some difficulty pretending to be adequate players at lower levels. 

Pardon my intrusion, but I have a question. Have you considered playing against humans?

I am asking because if you wish to progress chess skill wise, it is generally much better to play with human opponents. I don't know about that chess app, but chess bots here, especially those that are not really strong, poorly imitate human play. Instead they play a few good moves and then compensate with some outlandish blunder which is not generally how humans play.

Playing humans should be more interesting as well and that is the best way to see your current level of play.

You are entirely correct, however at this stage I would rather loose against a robot, maybe when I am more experienced I will play against humans.

I suspected as much. That is exactly why I've written this. The biggest advantage of playing against humans is that you will progress much faster. And, of course, the experience is much more awarding.

Take my example. I restarted playing less than 2 years ago after 20 years, since the beginning of my high school (and I wasn't that good back then anyway), I knew the basics and that is all. I avoided playing humans for 2-3 weeks as well. It turned out that my realistic rating after all that rust was around 1 100 - 1 200 here (that was my rating after let's say 2 weeks of playing).

The average user here is around 800 rated, and there are a lot of people rated below that, so after 10-20 games, your real rating will show and you will be paired with people around your strength afterwards.

Defeats will happen, some of them will be terrible, I know it firsthand. It can't be avoided as it is part of the game, even if you train against engines for a long time.

Of course it is your decision, but my advice is to start playing against flesh and bloods as soon as you can. The experience is just much better, and you will learn more. If you feel that you need help with anything regarding improvement, there are always people willing to help you out.

In any case, best of luck.

Thank you for taking the time to elaborate further. Similar to your experiences, the last time I played a human was my First year of High School, way back in 1971. Thinking more about potentially playing people, another possible issue would be the time differences. I have no interest in Speed Chess, hopefully I will find enough players that are willing to play Classic Chess against people in different time zones. 

I play longer games as well 60/0 or 45/45. Up to 1500 rating there will be enough people playing that. 1500 - 1900 a lot less, but there will be some. For those playing 30/0 games, there is no problem up to 2000 rating I feel. 

Actually, the chess notation you see is in PGN format. I purposely saved it like that, so you can just load it while you're in analysis mode on chess.com. All you have to do is go to chess.com/analysis and you'll see "Load PGN" option to the right of the chessboard. Click on it, and there will be a window to paste the moves in PGN format in it.  Then, just copy & paste one of the games I posted, and click on the Load PGN button.  It will give you the entire game to review, and if you turn off the "Self-analysis" checkbox, the chess.com analysis AI (Stockfish engine behind the scenes, I think) will provide the running commentary of all the moves.

I personally get very fascinated with all these chess bots, and it may have to do with my own computer science/computer programming background, but ever since I was a kid, I always liked poking holes in computer algorithms. I remember back in the late eighties when Chessmaster 200/2100 used to be really strong, there was a line in Italian opening where Chessmaster had a bug, which would cause it to lose. So, whenever it beat me really bad, I'd go and play that line against it.

But, yes, like Nikola mentioned here in this thread, bots will not replace humans, and we need to play against humans to get better. However,  if you've been gone from chess for a very long time, I think bots are great because you slowly warm up to the idea of playing regularly without having your ego and your pride on the line, which is what you have when always playing with human opponents. You can do what I do and get a book on a particular opening and study one line. Then, test drive it against the bot first. If the bot will not easily go into that line, you can always use the board editor and set up and play from there.  Once you feel somewhat comfy against the bot, then you can play unrated games here. Once you feel good with unrated, you can play rated. But I generally love that approach of incrementally stepping up your game, which really helps not quit in frustration. I quit chess in frustration in my teens not because I was bad at it, but because I'd develop a bad case of nerves and would play inferior chess, which would result in losses and decreased motivation to keep playing. And this place has plenty of very sharp, aggressive club-level players that will really, really push you in their games with you. Just because their rating may "only" be 1200 or 1300 or 1500 is very misleading. This is an international site, and I find 1500s much stronger here than maybe in my local area, as all the competition basically gravitates to a single spot (a chess server).  And it's all too easy to find yourself on horrible losing streaks, and it helps to have bots and AI's to play against a bit when you get into that confidence paralysis, where you feel like you'll never be able to win a game again against another human.

I think if you stick to level 8 or so with AI Factory Chess and keep playing until your win rate is > 50% and then start doing some serious chess study (books, etc) and go up to level 9, you'll do well to get yourself more mentally ready to play human opponents.

If you're philosophically minded and are stagnating with chess and need a different way of thinking about it, I'd highly recommend reading "7 Deadly Chess Sins" by GM Jonathan Rowson. I think it's that book that's elevated my play more than any other that I've read. It doesn't have a ton of specific/concrete advice, as much as it is brilliant in pointing out the types of thinking/decision making that leads to blunders and lost games.

Hello,

I was in a similar situation, semi-retired and back into Chess after a 40 years hiatus. Like yourself, I considered myself an intermediate player.
In the early 80's I played regularly at my local club and participated in a few club and local tournaments. Although I wasn't a burgeoning master in the making, I could hold my own around the 1400-1600 Elo mark and had fun. By 1985 life took over, and Chess gradually took a backseat. But like hives, the chess itch would pop up now and again, but I realised by the late '80s that I couldn't juggle family life, a blossoming career and Chess, so I gave up Chess completely.
The exciting part is this year; I started playing bots etc., because I lacked the confidence to play humans again. I noticed online there is a lot of speed chess, so I just joined in. The chess itch has returned with a vengeance; online, I rate around 1200. I've forgotten many of the openings, my calculation is way off, and I forget obvious and basic tactics and combinations. Slowly, the magic is coming back, but I have fun playing against others, and the skills are returning slowly.
My advice is to play people online and have fun if the magic returns, study and improve.
In January 2022, I intend to return to club play and take it seriously again, but for now, blitz is enjoyable.

Sorry I don't know what 60/0 or 45/45 means. At this stage I doubt I'll ever play anything other than drawn out classic chess, time will tell.

Thank you for the tips, I have now checked out the difference between PGN and AN, and I'm now aware of the analysis feature. 

I've never been into IT, I was slow in adopting computers, purchased my first home computer around 2005. I stopped playing Chess in my Second year of High School, other interests took over and none of my friends were interested in the game. After I graduated I moved a lot with work and never met anyone else interested in the game. I did have a Radio Shack 1650 Electronic Chess 60-2194 in the 1980's, which was an electronic marvel, at least to me ha ha. I played it over a few years on and off, leaking batteries ended it's life. 

I agree the Ratings are subject to a number of Factors. For example I have a higher rating on Lichess, over 1500 atm, mainly because their puzzles are always Free and I access them more often than the puzzles here. Of course that rating is just based on puzzles the same as on this site, and not a true reflection of my ability against real players. 

Thanks for the tip on the Chess book, my local library has a copy and I've reserved it together with a number of other Chess books.

Hi, thank you for commenting, great to hear from another Aussie. You were lucky to have access to so many players, I lived in a small country town in my teens, I was restricted to playing against a few guys in my High School Chess Club, at Lunch time.  Thank you for your advice, atm I can't see myself ever playing speed chess, maybe with more experience.

60|0 means 60 minutes + 0 seconds increment. 45|45 means 45 minutes for the game and 45 seconds increment for every move played. Those are the longest default controls you can play. I played some longer games during this time, but those are custom time controls and it is more difficult to play longer games  than 60|0 or 45|45 with random people.